“Tradition! Tradition! Without our traditions, our lives would be as shaky as a Fiddler on the Roof!” There’s a lot of truth in Tevye’s lyrics. Looking back over my 70 years, an annual Blum family tradition that helps keep our family steady is coming together to celebrate Passover. We are now in the week of Passover, rushing a lifetime of family memories into my mind.
Research shows that 90% of families fall victim to the adage “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations.” Shockingly, only 10% beat the odds. What are the best practices of those successful 10% that we can try to copy in our own families? In my own research, I compiled a list of the Top Ten Best Practices, as revealed in the slide below. Note that one of those 10 is Family Traditions, and the graphic next to it is an oak tree. Indeed, traditions keep us from falling off the roof, deeply rooted so we’re as steady as an oak tree when the winds of adversity blow our way.
My dear friend Kasia Flanagan at everydaylegacies.com teaches this truth in her post “What Are Your Traditions?”: “Traditions—they are not simply what we do, they become who we are, affecting everything from our identity to our sense of belonging, and the purpose we feel in our lives.”
My Passover memories take me back to the earliest days of my youth. The Blum family gathered each year for a Seder at the home of my father’s sister, Aunt Sophie Weinstein. A long row of tables was pushed together running the entire length of the “front room,” with Uncle Max at the head leading the first night’s Seder supper. From very old to very young, everyone participated. We went person-to-person down the table, each reading aloud the next passage from the Haggadah, the Passover story. I remember counting ahead to identify my passage so I could practice in my head before it was my turn. There were some hard words in the text, as Moses shouted “Let my people go!” and Pharaoh obstinately refused until the last of the Ten Plagues.
When Laurie and I married, we took over hosting the Blum Passover Seder. Our children, Adam and Lizzy, played major roles in the preparations. Most significantly, they compiled their own version of the Haggadah, a 41-page kid-friendly retelling of the Passover story. To this day, we use that Haggadah, as do a number of other families who have likewise fallen in love with the Blum version.
Another Seder memory was a skit performed every year by Lizzy and her best friend Sari Hochberger. It was unscripted and very clever, complete with numerous costume changes. It started with baby Moses hidden in a basket among the reeds by his sister Miriam, then to Pharaoh torturing a Jewish slave, and on to G-d (speaking through a burning bush) directing Moses to tell Pharaoh to “let my people go!’ They then graphically acted out each of the Ten Plagues, culminating in the death of the first born. The memories go on and on, and now we’re creating a whole generation of new Blum Passover traditions.
Click HERE to revisit my post of Sept. 14, 2021, “Tradition, Tradition! Your Family Traditions Matter More Than You May Realize.” In it I quoted from Mitzi Perdue’s book What It Means to Be Us, describing traditions as the “lifeblood of a family’s identity” – “the more traditions, the more glue.” I also referred to Bruce Feiler’s book The Secrets of Happy Families, telling of a Duke family tradition from their weekly Shabbat dinners. Grandfather Duke would fling yarmulkes like a Frisbee onto each grandson’s head. Feiler asked, “Is this in the Torah?” The family replied, “No, it’s in the Duke Family Hall of Fame, and that’s much more important.”
Traditions such as these are more important indeed. They are essential to our survival as a family. I attended a Shabbat sermon by Rabbi Shlomo Farhi where he actually broke into song “I’m Still Standing.” Rabbi Farhi credits Jewish observance and practices as the reason we’re “still standing,” even after centuries of persecution (still occurring today at an alarming rate). Even on the way to the gas chamber, Holocaust victims sang in Yiddish, “We will outlive them.” Deeply rooted in our traditions and identity, no adversity will destroy us.
As I write the last paragraph of this post on the morning of tonight’s first Seder, two of my grandkids (Lucy and Grey) just happily interrupted my flow to ask how they’ll be able to find tonight’s Afikomen, the piece of matza we hide during the Seder so kids can find it and get a prize. I can see in their twinkling eyes the makings of lifetime memories and a new generation of Blum family traditions.
Wishing all of you a happy and meaningful Passover and Easter.
